Tools

Strong cast, weak writing in director Gavin Hood’s drone warfare drama. Helen Mirren stars as a war hawk British Army colonel, with the late Alan Rickman as a vacillating general, backed up by US drone button-pusher Aaron Paul and a target-spotting Kenyan spy played by Barkhad Abdi from Captain Phillips — all trying to engineer an air strike on suspected terrorists in Nairobi. Together, they’re less dramatically effective than the figure of Alia (Aisha Takow), a nine-year-old Kenyan girl who unwittingly makes herself the focus of possible collateral damage by selling bread outside the target house. Not really much of a nail-biter, unless we count the nails of screenwriter Guy Hibbert. Also with Jeremy Northam and Iain Glen (104 min.).
ByKelly Vance